Tom Michael and Don Reiman

[00:01] TOM MICHAEL: I'm tom Michael. I'm 52 years old. I'm here on Monday, August 22, 2022 in Boise, Idaho. I'm here with my friend Don Reiman and my pal and adventurer buddy, although I haven't seen him in a while.

[00:18] DON REIMAN: And I'm don Reiman 67 years young. Today's Monday, August 22, 2022. We're in Boise, idaho. I'm being interviewed by Tom Michael tom Michael, who's a friend, and we've done some adventures together and taken the opportunity to get reacquainted again.

[00:36] TOM MICHAEL: So I just heard you're 15 years older than me. And I kind of, when I first arrived in Idaho, I kind of looked up to you to think, man, this guy, he's doing all his adventures. He's healthy. I really want to understand what Idaho is all about. And as I've known you and, you know, really not for very long, you've been like, oh, I've been there. Oh, I've rafted that. Oh, I've climbed that. Oh, I've flown over that. So I think, do I need, like an action hero that says Don Reiman this little, this little action hero I need? So really, you've been kind of a window for me, at least, into understanding the Idaho backcountry a bit. And so, yeah, I'd love to hear more about that. And then I heard you say something. Sorry, I asking you two questions here, but that you are a lifelong idahoan and you hadn't even been out of this county for more than like a couple weeks at a time ever.

[01:31] DON REIMAN: Yes. So I was born and raised here, St. Luke's Hospital downtown. My grandfather actually went to grade school at Lowell elementary, which is where I went to grade school and lived here my entire life. Went to school locally, Meridian High school and then Boise State University, and been on many adventures around the world and all over Idaho and the US. But I've actually never been out of Ada county for longer than three weeks in my entire life, which is, I think it's amazing on one hand and almost embarrassing on the other.

[02:08] TOM MICHAEL: Have you had opportunities to take jobs elsewhere that you've just turned down or.

[02:12] DON REIMAN: Yeah. When I was younger, I first started in the financial services industry. Boise was actually an economic slowdown in state. In the early eighties. They had more people moving out than moving in. There was urban renewal downtown where they were tearing buildings down. There was parking lots, and nothing was really going on. And I actually took a position with the company with the understanding that within six months they had to move me to a city that had more opportunity than Boise. And those options were Albuquerque, Kansas City, and the twin Cities, Manampus, St. Paul. They didn't do that. I ended up taking another job, and then I ended up traveling out of the state at least once a month. And that's when I realized what Boise really was. I went all over the US, but never found another place that had all the things to offer that Boise does.

[03:04] TOM MICHAEL: So. I don't even know this. Tell me about your family here.

[03:07] DON REIMAN: Okay. So a relatively small family. My dad was an entrepreneur. He was in commercial printing. And then my mother. And then I had a brother and sister here and grew up here. And they all never left Idaho either. Well, I can't. I got to take that back. My sister did move out of the area with her husband for a while and then move back, so. And then I have three grown children.

[03:34] TOM MICHAEL: Okay. So I remember when you, you know, you brought me mountain biking for the first time on these trails. Oh, this is challenging. And now it's something I do a lot of. And you, in fact, chose to live, like, right up in these foothills. What do the Boise foothills mean to you?

[03:54] DON REIMAN: You know, I'm going to share something because this is one of the things in my growth as a person in Boise and politically and other things, grew up very conservative. And I would still call myself a conservative by what most places would. Maybe not as conservative as some things going on now, but I thought it was fairly enlightening for me. There was two different things that happened that when I heard they were going to do it, I said, how can they do that? Taxpayers property and money. And one was the green belt. I was living here when they passed the ordinances to anybody that had property along the river, had to provide the setback and allow the easement for the green belt. I was opposed to that. I thought, hey, that's their property. They shouldn't have to do it. They had the foresight to buy there after seeing what it did for the community. It was visionary, and it was one of the most amazing things they ever did in this city. And it's one of our greatest treasures. The second one was the foothills. Levy. Well, what are they doing? Spending taxpayers money for recreation and that kind of thing? And I had not been a mountain biker. And then they did that. And then once I started mountain biking, then I realized how important again and visionary that was because what a treasure that is for us. So the foothills have been really important. When I was in grade school, we used to, my buddies, we'd ride our bikes up to the LDS church on the corner of Hill Road and 28th street, park there, and do a big climb up to the top of the hill behind it with our lunch and eat lunch sitting on top of the hill and catch lizards and actually even rode our bike on a couple of small trails that were there then that probably are now one of the mountain biking trails. So big changes that way.

[05:40] TOM MICHAEL: So at first, you looked at it in economic terms, like, or as maybe the government overreaching and taking someone's property. The Boise Greenbelt, which is the pathway along the river, is like 51, 52 years old right now. And I don't know when the levee came into force, but I know, like, in the eighties and nineties, it really started to take off.

[06:01] DON REIMAN: Isn't that right?

[06:02] TOM MICHAEL: So then what, what turned your thinking from that economic bottom line thinking to. Or maybe it was economic bottom line thinking. Like what?

[06:10] DON REIMAN: Well, it was more of a, I think, individual rights thing that, how can they do that? And then from an economic thing, from a taxation of, you know, why would they take people's tax dollars and do that with it when there's so many other needs? But it was. It's. It's been fascinating, and I love the fact that how many people get enjoyment out of both the Greenbelt and the foothills? And, and you're right, I live up at the end of Mountain Cove Road now, so I live right where the trail is, one of the main trailheads for all those trails. And so whether we're walking the dog, riding our bikes, or just hiking, it's an amazing place. And that's probably one of the biggest changes that Boise gone through in the time I've been here. So my grandparents lived at the corner of Strawberry Glen and the river, and there was the strawberry Glen bridge there. And I can remember before the Glenwood bridge was in, and that was the main. You had to jog around over to Strawberry Glen, come back and used to duck hunt on the river right there, and pheasant hunt between here and there. And so the open space is to watch those disappear in the valley, you know, is interesting. And then, so to do some things to keep open spaces in the hills and even where they're developing, but public access is, I think that's an amazing thing that we have here, and I take full advantage of the outdoors.

[07:35] TOM MICHAEL: What would Boise have looked like if there wasn't that foothills levee? Do you think.

[07:43] DON REIMAN: There would be a few more houses on the ridge than there are now? And I don't think the, the impact of that is the way we're growing because of space. It would just now be, we'd probably be losing many of those trails and access to a lot of those canyons and stuff, because when the big property owners had them, would sell them off and they would be subdivided, which, you know, is part of growth. But it's also, I think there's a fine balance there where you can have that but still maintain access for the public.

[08:17] TOM MICHAEL: If I could do a quick comparable. So I'm a Chicagoan from Chicago, and, I don't know, 100, 2030 years ago, kind of the rich folks there in Chicago, Potter, Palmer, Marshall Fields, all these folks, you know, Chicago sits right next to Lake Michigan, one of the Great Lakes, and they decided that they're going to make the area around the lake a public park. They call it Grant park. It was one of the largest parks in the, in the states. And to this day, there's, I think, one private, there's one private block in the entire city. The rest of it's all public. And it's interesting now because that was a tough call probably back then because there was still so much industry and commerce that came through the water, just like on the Boise river. But now, what a call it is to the point where these other cities, Pittsburgh, Cleveland. Sorry, is Pittsburgh. That's a bad idea. Let me say. Milwaukee, Cleveland, all these other kind of cities along the water are reinventing their lakefront. And actually, you know, if you've been to Cleveland, they're trying to put new buildings there, sports fields, and trying to make the river clean again, because they know it's such an asset now for economic driver, too, for tourism.

[09:37] DON REIMAN: Right. Well, I think the quality of life is a key thing that sometimes gets overlooked. So.

[09:44] TOM MICHAEL: Yeah, let's dig into that. So you're a mountain biker, you're a trail runner at all?

[09:52] DON REIMAN: I don't run. I've never been much of a runner. And then I had both my knees replaced last March. But I got into cycling, first road cycling, and then transitioned into mountain biking. And so I do a lot of mountain biking, endurance mountain biking, and that's.

[10:06] TOM MICHAEL: Another facet to Idaho. These endurance athletes, I know a lot, some sponsored athletes will live here. So I've heard you've done, most recently, one of the big, big, biggest races in the country, the leadville 100.

[10:19] DON REIMAN: Yes.

[10:20] TOM MICHAEL: How did that go?

[10:21] DON REIMAN: It didn't go as well as I would have liked this year, but it was my own fault. After my knee surgeries last year, I set that as a goal. So I'd have a motivation to train and get back in shape and active again. And so I really wasn't quite ready for that grueling event because it's a 105 miles, 12,000 vertical feet of climbing, and the lowest elevation on the course is 9300. And you pedal all the way up to 12,500. I have finished it twice before and missed the cut off that you, if you make it under 12 hours, you get a really nice belt buckle. And my time was 12 hours, three minutes and 46 seconds. I'd stopped to help two people on a section of the trail that were physically struggling and wasn't paying close enough attention to the time. So that's why I ended up going back. But this year I got, they have a time cutoff at 40, 60 and 80 miles. I made it 40 miles and then missed the cutoff for the time. So I got pulled from the race.

[11:21] TOM MICHAEL: So how did that feel? Did you know you were going to hit the.

[11:23] DON REIMAN: Yeah, I could tell by the time that I. It was hard and it was discouraging, but at the same time motivating because I've now got to decide. I'm kind of contemplating whether to set it as a goal to race at my 70th when I turn 70. So it gives me three years to train to get ready and go back.

[11:42] TOM MICHAEL: So are there other 70, 67 year old, 70 year olds doing this race?

[11:47] DON REIMAN: Oh, yeah.

[11:48] TOM MICHAEL: So it's pretty competitive all the way through all the age groups.

[11:51] DON REIMAN: Yeah. My first mountain bike race when I moved into the 60 group, I think, man, now I can be competitive, you know, but what I've discovered is when you're doing those kind of events in your sixties, 65, seventies, the people that are doing them are pretty serious about it.

[12:10] TOM MICHAEL: So, yeah, so you called me one day and said, hey, or you called me or texted me and said, and I kind of just met you and said, do you want to climb Mount Rainier? And I think my first response was, are you drinking right now? Because it's like, why would you think I would want to climb a glacier? But you said, oh, no, no, we'll do it this day. We can do it. Talk to my wife. And I said, okay, I'll do it. So, mountain climbing, what attracts you to that?

[12:46] DON REIMAN: I wouldn't label myself as a mountain climber. I'm more of a trekker. Rainier was the most technical climb I've ever done. My entire life. I've wanted to learn anything and everything I can about everything. Always been really curious. One of my beliefs in life is that if you watch children, they're absolutely curious. They're not afraid to ask questions and look and do things. And I think as we age and get older, most of us lose that. And I've actually worked hard at hanging on to that curiosity and willingness to fail at trying something that I don't know how to do. And so I had heard about Kilimanjaro, actually, in Africa, and that somebody had done that. And I said, hmm, I think I ought to do that. So started talking to some people and we put a group together and went to Africa and climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, which was 19,300ft. So having done that, and then I used to train at the y, swimming, and there was all these triathletes there and they, you know, they do the. The swim, the bike and the run. And I'd started getting into biking, cycling, and I liked that. And all these guys were in such great shape and they were all positive and energetic and enthusiastic about life. And so then it started crossing my mind, well, I wonder if I'm tough enough to do what they're doing. And so I had an enlightenment that I didn't have to worry that if I couldn't do as fast as them, because I wasn't going to try and win anything. I just wanted to do a triathlon and finish within the allotted time. And quite frankly, it was to find out two things. Could I physically and mentally accomplish something that was that hard? Because what I found out, the mental part is as much as the physical part, when you're doing the endurance stuff. So, in typical fashion for me, my first triathlon was the boise half ironman. The first year it came to Boise, so I did it and it was one of the hardest things I've ever done. But I did finish and. Cause I don't run, I fast walk the run part and just push myself to keep a pace up for that, and was able to finish in a lot of time. So these other things, when you hear about it, it's like, well, what else can you do to kind of challenge yourself physically, mentally? And some of them, I would say even intellectually, as far as preparing and understanding and what it takes and that type of thing. And if you got any ideas of something fun to do, I'm open to her, so.

[15:32] TOM MICHAEL: But, Don, it's more than that, though. With Ranier, it's. You're on a team. I mean, it's. I mean, it's our friend Lori, your ex wife, Mary. I mean, these are people you're roped to. So what was the rainier experience like for you?

[15:50] DON REIMAN: Raniere was different because it was the first time that it was the point that you were really dependent on others, you know, even though that's not really accurate. Anytime you do an excursion, even climbing Kilimanjaro, Whitewater, I do a lot of whitewater rafting. And when you have eight boats in the middle of the wilderness, it doesn't matter if one boat's in trouble, it affects the entire group. So there's a real responsibility that goes with that on both sides, both to make sure you're doing things right so you don't endanger somebody else or ruin their trip. And then also if something does go wrong for somebody that you're there to, for them to depend on and support them. So Rainier was different in that regard. As you recall, we did it early because it was in May, so we were in snow from the minute we stepped out of the parking lot. But it was warm enough that we were post holing to start with. And so, you know, getting up there.

[16:47] TOM MICHAEL: I heard, I recall, I don't know if they were feeding us this line. It was one of the fastest ascents that that guy did because he could.

[16:54] DON REIMAN: It was our 8th, his 18th year of guiding, and he actually said that our group was the fastest ascent he'd ever had. And part of it was because everybody was in really good shape. And I was the old person in the group at that time. I think I was 62 then. But we, you know, if you remember, they had, they divided people into kind of three groups and it was obvious that our group was faster than the other two groups. And I think one of the interesting things there was a lesson was I've always. The safety training that you go through, if you remember, they had us learning how to slide and self arrest with the pickaxe and how to work with the ropes and all that. And that part you say, I want to get to the climb, the exciting part, but. So getting up on that glacier and being roped together and looking down in a couple places and I don't know if you recall or not, but on the way down, I did take a step and the trail collapsed and I fell and did have to self arrest with the pickaxe.

[17:58] TOM MICHAEL: I do remember, yeah. And you kind of was there. You were there for a moment. Yeah, more than a moment. So I'm so glad we ascended in the dark because, I don't know, mentally it would have freaked me out. And coming down, I remember I kind of fell to my, no, this is going up. I kind of felt, and they, they would shout at you, get up, and you realize only later at light how close you are to like a crevice. And so that's super dangerous. We're all roped together.

[18:24] DON REIMAN: Yeah. If you remember when we were going up the snow bridge that was there, the guide walked up, looked at it, and then took us around. And where he took us around looked more dangerous to me than what we crossed. But on the way down, when we got to that spot, that snow bridge was gone. So, you know, that's, I also believe in using people that know what they're doing for things. I would never climb that mountain now with just a friend or somebody having seen, seen it. And we had as good a weather as you can have and you could see, but after seeing what we saw going up, down, imagine being on top and then the weather moving in, being foggy, and you not be able to see where you're going.

[19:05] TOM MICHAEL: So it's, you were pretty beat up on the way down.

[19:08] DON REIMAN: Yeah.

[19:08] TOM MICHAEL: You were tired.

[19:09] DON REIMAN: Yeah, I was, I was. That was, it was a, it was a hard trek for me.

[19:13] TOM MICHAEL: So, um, okay, so let's stay with winter because another thing you've kind of showed me was I was like, okay, I can try this skiing thing. I went up to bogus, and there you are. You're a volunteer for that, for the bogus basin ski place, which is a nonprofit ski hill. You're wearing a red coat. And what do you do?

[19:35] DON REIMAN: Well, I'm a bogus basin mountain host, and for the last two years I've actually been the director of the bogus basin mountain host program. So we're a part of the national ski Patrol. Bogus Basin Recreational ski area is the full name, or actually bogus Basin recreational area now because they have full summer operations too. And so we're a sub of the national ski patrol and kind of work more with guest services that way where our job is to greet people to the resort and then we ski around. And if we find people that are hurt, we call in the ski patrol and protect them while they're working on the individual. We find lost skiers and get them back. We find skiers that are struggling, helping them down the mountain, give directions, and just more likely, I just say we ski around, be friendly.

[20:23] TOM MICHAEL: So why do you do that? Why not just sit inside and ski yourself and drink hot chocolate? Like, why, why did you sign up for this?

[20:29] DON REIMAN: Well, I started skiing at bogus in 1964, and bogus was a very small hill. Then they had one chair left, a t bar, two palmas, three rope tows, and then a free rope tow. And I had skied enough in my life. I've been fortunate to do cat skiing, helicopter skiing, and backcountry skiing. And so I had gotten kind of bored with it, even though I loved it. And I wasn't going up that much. And I was doing a fitness program at the Y, and somebody said that they were training because they were going to be a ski mountain host. I said, what's that? And it sounded amazing to me because it was bogus. I feel it's enough of my life, having grown up on a mountain, what it meant to me that a third of my ashes are supposed to be distributed at bogus basin. That's how important it is to me. The key was it was a way to give back, to help people and give to people the mountain in the community. And it actually kind of changes skiing. And when I talk to people that are going to be mountain hosts, something like that, I said, we ski with a purpose now. We're not just up there skiing to ski. We have a purpose. And it's been very rewarding. It's hard work because we ski all day long, not just go up for 3 hours and come down, and we ski in all conditions, not just the good days. So. But it's really a way to give back and, and feel like adding value.

[21:59] TOM MICHAEL: So it's. Skiing is kind of, in other places, considered, you know, pretty rich person sport. Hard to access. Equipment's expensive. But we were. I was stunned when I first saw bogus basin, which is a nonprofit you could spend for entire years past as much as you spend one weekend at a high end american resort and you can rent equipment. So how does. So it is one of those places that, to me at least, feels like there's a little bit more of a community feel to it.

[22:34] DON REIMAN: Well, that's what it was. It was a community hill and not profit nonprofit. And over the years, it struggled financially up and down. But then recently, they got, about five years ago, they got a new general manager and their board, and they had the vision to go to all year round operation, add the mountain biking and the other summer activities up there, and they're doing very well now. And bogus is one of the gems of Boise. It didn't have the name of Sun Valley or Vale at those places, but it's 2600 acres of skiable. It's got seven chairlifts, it's got a very variety of train, a lot of your resorts don't have the variety of train. We got everything from beginner, intermediate, expert, and advanced. Lots of training, ski off run, so in the powder, in the trees, that kind of thing. And one of the goals there is to keep it affordable and yet still grow it to handle the influx of people into the area.

[23:39] TOM MICHAEL: And also adaptive sports. Do you work with folks like that? Because there's a lot of accessibility issues with sports and there's a certain type of skiing equipment now.

[23:48] DON REIMAN: Yeah, they do have an adaptive program up there. I'm not a part of that program, and I've never done that.

[23:53] TOM MICHAEL: Okay, so we, we've, we've, we. I guess we haven't. I'm trying to think of. I look at you, don, I think, okay, Idaho adventures. And you mentioned rafting to Idaho rivers. What, what is, why do that? Why get on it? Why get on a river and, you know, put yourself through rafting?

[24:13] DON REIMAN: Well, I've always liked adventure and not necessarily scary adventure and rafting does not have to be scary, but I love the outdoors. I saw one of the questions they had here, if people ran out of things to ask is, well, what do you do when you're stressed or that? And my thing is like to be active, go out, and I don't want to be around people. I want to go for a bike ride or a walk or something where I'm in the outdoors and just have that. That's kind of restorative for me. So I love our outdoors. I grew up, I was on my first camping trip at three weeks of age, and I had my daughter on her first camping trip when she was three weeks old. And so grew up four wheeling in the desert here, south of here, the Waihe mountains, and then to the north. And before four wheeling was known by, you know, most people. And so camping, hunting, fishing, and all that. So I love the outdoors, and, but I also like the solitude. I love people when I'm in town, but I like the solitude. So rafting was one of those things. I did a day raft on the main salmon river up at Riggins. It was with a commercial guide. And I thought, well, this is kind of cool. And then I met some people that did it. And so I said, I want to try this. So I put in, and the first time I ever put in, I drew a permit for the main salmon river. And so had some friends that had the gear, and I borrowed a boat. And so my first started rafting. That was back in about 2000. So a lot of the stuff I do now, I took on, actually, later in life than most people. I didn't take up actually cycling very much till 2006, but when I do things, I kind of go all in on them. So buying equipment, but the experience of rafting to be in the outdoors, the beauty of the river, the mountains, the people, because it's a very intimate thing, because even though you're on separate boats, but every night at camp, you're camped on a small campsite. And so you're, you know, you go on a rafting trip with somebody, by the time the trip's over, you know them very well. So it combines all aspects of humanity in my mind. I mean, exercise, adventure, the outdoors, scenic people, relationships.

[26:33] TOM MICHAEL: So when you're stressed, you have a bad day, you feel like that's a tonic for you. That's a relief.

[26:38] DON REIMAN: Yeah, it's. The outdoors is spiritual for me.

[26:44] TOM MICHAEL: So. And then one other aspect is flying. Why become a pilot?

[26:52] DON REIMAN: I think. I don't know. I think it was implanted in my mind when I was a child watching tv, and there was a show called Sky King, and it opened up, it was this big rancher, and when they opened the show, it showed him and his Cessna 310 buzzing the ranch, and it was, you know, sky King. And there was just something about that that seemed intriguing to me. And so when I was on the fire department, I was 21 and working for Boise City fire department, and I started looking at it and I said, well, if I'm going to do it, I just need to do it. So I went out and found a place that gave flight instruction and did the ground school and started taking flying lessons and got my pilot's license.

[27:37] TOM MICHAEL: And where does it take you?

[27:39] DON REIMAN: Where is it taken me?

[27:41] TOM MICHAEL: I mean, where do you like to go?

[27:42] DON REIMAN: Oh, my favorite thing is flying in the Idaho backcountry. So Idaho has more backcountry airstrips than any state except Alaska. People come from all over the United States, Texas, Florida, California, to fly in our backcountry. All over the world, actually. But so it's, we have a lot because of the before the primitive area was instituted and those strips are grandfathered in. And so that was the way that they got supplies in for some of the logging places, the mining, the homesteaders back there. And so we have these gem of all these airstrips scattered around all over Idaho. And it's one of those things that when you first start flying, you're comfortable with learning how to land and take off and navigate somewhere. But as you progress whitewater rafting the same way you can do banks to beehive. That's a really easy run. Or you can move up to the middle fork or to the north fork of the payette, where you have to. It challenges your knowledge and ability. And flying in the backcountry does that. Exciting. And then one of my passions is introducing people to their firsts. I love it. Well, this is the first time I've done that. I took last Monday, this past Monday, I took a guy that was an exchange student with my significant other, Elizabeth. He was an exchange student here from the Netherlands. Well, he's now 22, come back to visit, and his cousin came with him and in Europe, so they'd never been rafting. So we took them on a little whitewater rafting trip, and then the next morning, I had to go to McCall for business, so I actually took them on a flight. And so there was two things for both of them that they'd never had the opportunity.

[29:25] TOM MICHAEL: So you don't do this just with me. You've done this. You do this with everyone who moves to the state?

[29:29] DON REIMAN: Yeah. Yeah. Well, we took you flying, and then the flying has opened up all kinds of things, experiences. I mean, I flew to Alaska and flew all around Alaska one year. I've flown birds for the peregrine foundation. So I did three different trips where I flew alpomoto falcon chicks that they raised here in captivity, and they were going to take them out to be released. Flew one lode to Marfa, Texas, coral, New Mexico. And the longest flight with that was Mustang island on the east Gulf of Texas.

[30:03] TOM MICHAEL: So you were following a flight pattern down, like the one through Marfa, Texas, to Mexico?

[30:13] DON REIMAN: No, I was flying birds that were. The eggs were hatched here at the peregrine fountain, and there's a window there where a few days that they found from the science that they need to get them released into a hack box where there's the right habitat for you. So I flew three boxes of birds from Boise. They hatched them here at the peregrine foundation, and then I flew them to Marfa, Texas, where a field team picked us up. And then we went out and then put the birds in the hack boxes, and then they released them from there. So I did that to Socorro and then Mustang island. That program has been discontinued because it actually repopulated all of the suitable habitat that they have for those birds.

[30:59] TOM MICHAEL: That's good. It was a success.

[31:00] DON REIMAN: A fun thing is I flew a condor egg from Boise to the San Diego safari park because they. For breeding purposes and genetics. So that egg was hatched here, but they had to get it there. So I flew a propagation specialist with an egg and an incubator to San Diego, and we took it to the San Diego safari park, where it did hatch. And they named it a greek name for high flyer because of how it got there.

[31:31] TOM MICHAEL: Didn't someone hearing all that, your activities and exploits in places here, didn't they call you once a renaissance man? You weren't sure what that meant, and you thought maybe it was insulting.

[31:41] DON REIMAN: Well, no, you're close. But it's funny, because having grown up here and I hadn't had a lot of exposure to things, and one day somebody said, oh, you're a regular renaissance man. And I immediately proved him wrong by saying, what's that? I didn't know what it meant at the time.

[32:02] TOM MICHAEL: So that's good. So I like how you felt like, you know, the Boise Levy and the foothills or the river cleanup, you know, kind of politically seemed to you like maybe like a government power grab or something like that, but. And so, as you said, you're, you know, center, right, a conservative. But then how has that changed here in Idaho? It almost seems like. And I think you've said you don't have a home.

[32:34] DON REIMAN: Yeah, well, it's hard when you think about, I've got a great example. I feel like Idaho, we've become kind of a conflicted population in that those that have been here forever don't have as much problem with the growth as people that have come in later. And maybe that's because they've seen what it can become if too many people come in because of where they're leaving. But for me, all the things I love to do politically in Idaho, if you say anything about conservation, that's like a swear word. Oh, we don't want to have any do with conservation environmentalists. Yet 95% of the people that live here enjoy hunting, fishing, camping, hiking, rafting, you know, the river, everything that we have. And that seems like an unusual conflict to me, that you would take one stance one way, yet love the other. So I think the conflict has come in probably from people liking what we have so much and wanting to keep it the way it has always been, which is not possible. So I think the key there for me is, from my experiences, is looking at, you got to have compromise, and there's got to be, you can't stop the growth. You can't stop people from moving here. So how do you do it in a way that you can maintain the most and the best of what you have. I mean, Boise, to this day is still known as a very friendly community. Some of the changes that I see from when I was younger here, I'm now more and more. When you pass people, there's more and more people that will look at the ground or look past you and not greet you. That used to never happen here. More litter, stuff like that. We have a higher population, homeless, things like that. There's things that are coming with the growth, but this conflict of wanting it one way and probably being. I think if you're unrealistic about keeping something the way it was, there's nothing in life, even rocks change. I mean.

[34:41] TOM MICHAEL: Well, how about this? You look around at Wyoming, Montana. There's this book out now called Billionaire Wilderness, where a lot of rich folks are parking their money in these beautiful rural places. Idaho is a little different, they say, because so much of it is public land or state land. So what's your thought? I mean, you've been to these small airstrips. Do you see gates now where you used to not see gates?

[35:04] DON REIMAN: I don't see it so much of the airstrips because where they're located, I see it when I'm out on backcountry roads with the four wheel drive, where there's that. We call them the green gate, you know, where they've been locked and. And other areas where private landowners have bought something and closed it off. And so that's a little bit disturbing because of. It's their right, but it's when I flew birds to Marfa, Texas. This guy was an avid hunter, and it was nothing for as far as you could see. I said, you must love it here, all this ground. He says, I can't set foot on it. Why? Well, it's private land, and the landowner for that has probably never even seen it or set foot on it and won't, but it's all locked up. So that's one of the treasures that we have here. And I didn't realize that, not having lived anywhere else. But you get east of the Rocky mountains and public lands don't exist much. It's not like for this area, where you just go out and go backpacking or hiking or camping and sit up your tent and stay there.

[36:05] TOM MICHAEL: And I know we're going to close now because we're just wrapping up. So I'd like to ask, what's your. Well, actually, I should follow up one more on that next question. So where do you think we're going and how do you, what concerns you about Idaho right now.

[36:28] DON REIMAN: My opinion on it is the majority, 80% of the population, has always been able to not worry about politics and other things and just let it take its course. And my feeling is, now that we've allowed extremists on both sides have a big voice, and they're very passionate about what they do. So they have, typically, it's one or two items, and they're just rabid and passionate about it. So they're very vocal. And personally, I think it's going to take 80% of the population to start stepping up and saying, hey, wait a minute. I understand how you feel, and that's fine for you to believe that, but the majority of us have a different belief, and we're going to have to start stepping up and being more active and saying, no, let's get logical about this. And there is compromise where everybody can have room to live a life that they want to live.

[37:25] TOM MICHAEL: Yeah. So people have to be engaged to kind of keep the extremes at bay. So, what's your next adventure, and why should I join you?

[37:37] DON REIMAN: Well, I'm kind of in a crossroads right now. I think I've taken up this autocrossing, so I got some autocross racing. I was 66 when I started autocross racing, and so I've got a goal to get better at that. One of my goals is to ride the tour of the divide. It's a bicycle ride where you start in Canada and ride the continental divide all the way to Mexico. The hard part for me is I like doing so many different things, and I'm not sure I'm quite ready to take 27 days of my life just to bicycle every day.

[38:15] TOM MICHAEL: So you're camping, you're self supported, you're bringing your. And you're going up a pretty steep ranges, but you're out on the road for, what, three weeks?

[38:25] DON REIMAN: Well, it would take me 27 to 30 days to do it, so. And then. And then I got some flying experiences. I want to go to Alaska again and fly around there some more, so.

[38:39] TOM MICHAEL: Oh, don, I'll live this all through you, then.

[38:42] DON REIMAN: Yeah. Well, you know, you said something earlier, and I had a guy when I first started cycling, he was about 65, and I looked at him and said, that's my mentor. I want to be able to do what he's doing when I'm that age. You commented that when you met me, you said, oh, this guy. I hope I could do that. And, you know, if that was a motivator for me, and I just can't, you know, I don't feel my age. All the activities I do, I don't act my age. I don't think my age. And so I think just, you know, encouraging people to be active and take on something new and experience. We have so many things. It doesn't have to be outdoorsy like I am. It can be anything. So Idaho is an amazing place. I'm proud to be a native and part of it and share it with other people.

[39:32] TOM MICHAEL: Thanks for repping it so well. It's been nice talking with you about it.

[39:35] DON REIMAN: Thanks, Tom.